My beautiful Siberian Huskies!

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Inspired by the "letter from our readers" posting in the Oct/Nov 2009 Quilting Arts magazine, I have decided to take up the challenge as Amelia Bacon did, and create a 5" quilt block each week during 2010 and journal about it. Extra inspiration, of course, goes to the movie "Julie & Julia" for getting me back to this blog I created so many months ago and to keep it going by using this site for my weekly journal entries and photos of completed quilt blocks.

So, my first block must be completed by Sunday, January 10th. I have decided my weeks will be Monday-Sunday, that way I have a full weekend in tact for each week to work on my projects.

Is there anyone out there that wants to take up this challenge with me? I'd love to link to your postings as well so that we can motivate and inspire one another to keep on quilting and journaling about it!

In December 2009, I created a lap quilt for a good friend of mine who had moved across country. Their new house had lime green walls in the kitchen and living room and was very contemporary. They bought a purple couch to go with the walls and have some fun with color. Well....I decided that a lap quilt was in order to tie them together!

So this is their anniversary/birthday/Christmas/house-warming present.

I used the 6" X-Block cutting tool and did the reverse pattern with a lattice work kind of zig-zag of purple over a lime green background. The back of the quilt is the darker purple fabric.

My friend's daughter was turning 4 in September. I was inspired by the story about how she loved cupcakes and had to have them for birthdays. And she loves pink and purple.

I was a Joann's Fabrics, and I saw this flannel cupcake fabric and I thought - well, I've always wanted to do a rag quilt, I should start by making one for Olivia! Her birthday was in a couple of days, and I figured I could get it done.

So, I bought some matching flannels, went home and knocked this out in a couple of days. Olivia loves her quilt and likes to show it off. It is soft and fluffy and matches her bedroom.

These photos were not taken in good light, so they are hard to see the true finished product. It also shrunk WAY more than I thought it would, so in the future, I would make another row and column or 2 so that it didn't turn out so small.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

After several larger quilts, I decided I needed to think smaller. This is an expensive habit and I don't always have the patience to see a large quilt come to life!

After Multinomah Falls, I really wanted to pursue more "artsy" quilts. I had a book by Julie Hirota called "Art Glass Quilts". Once again, not knowing what I would get myself into, I thought, "I could do that!'

Well, of course as is my style, I didn't want to use any of the patterns the book came with. But I did see one of hers from her photo gallery that I really liked. So, I traced it, took it to my local copy store to be enlarged, and went from there!

I really enjoyed this style of quilting. I felt like I was being more artistic. Immediately, I wanted to make this for my friend, George.

The photo shown here is the quilt after it had been machine quilted by Margaret Kenning down in Southern CA, and was sent to me by my mom's camera phone. Once I complete the binding, I will take another picture and include the finished product.

In April of 2007, I visited my mom in Oregon for an extended weekend. We felt like doing something "crafty" and went to her local Craft Warehouse. My mom has been sewing most of her life, but I resisted tooth and nail growing up. When I saw all of the selection of fabrics and quilt designs I thought, "hey, we could do that!"So, we bought a pattern, and selected fabrics for a lap quilt for my living room. Of course, we couldn't be happy with just that. My friend, Pam, was having a birthday and we decided that she needed one too! So, we selected fabrics for TWO lap quilts, using the same pattern. And we had about 2 or 3 days to finish it!It was a lot of fun. I cut the pieces, and she did the sewing. We then laid out the blocks on the floor and decided how we were going to lay them out. I left Oregon with 2 quilt tops completed!My aunt has been quilting for awhile, so I gave them to her and she had her local machine quilter finish the quilting for me. She also sewed the bindings on for me, as I had no idea what I had gotten myself into!Well, I was hooked. My mom bought me a sewing machine for my birthday that year, and the rest is history. I had become tired of scrapbooking, and wasn't doing theatre anymore, so I needed a new creative outlet. Well....I think I have found it!(photos coming soon!)

After I had ventured into sewing with my mom in April of 2007 and made 2 lap quilts with her, I decided I should probably take a class to learn how to do it right!

So, I went to my local quilt shop in Auburn, CA - Cabin Fever Quilt Shoppe - and enrolled in a basic quilting class that taught several different blocks and sewing techniques. I selected baby fabrics and made this quilt for my newly born great niece, Avery Howell. Brittney and my husband, Rick, helped me decide the block layout.

I made this quilt for my oldest step-son's 16th birthday. Matt enjoys music and playing his electric guitar. At the time, he was really into "black", so I kept the middle section as blacks, grays and whites with music notes, then I found this great colorful fabric with electric guitars on it, for the border.This is a simple Rail block, and was my Twin quilt. I pieced the entire quilt together, and had a local lady do the machine quilting. My mom finished the binding, as I was short on time and needed the help!(photo coming soon!)

The second quilt that I finished for Christmas 2008 was for my step-son, Travis. He is into music and playing the guitar, and when I visited my mom for Thanksgiving, we found this great fabric at her local Craft Warehouse. We fell in love with it, so we scratched the original design and fabric that we were going to use for him, and made this one instead.

She helped me sew the pieces together as well on this one, and it is the same pattern as Brittney's quilt, just a little smaller.

I made this quilt for my step-daughter, Brittney, for Christmas 2008. This was the largest quilt I had made to date. My mother helped me sew this one together, and I had the machine quilting done by a local lady. This photo is just the finished top, before it was quilted and finished.

I bought this kit at a quilt show in March of 2008, with the intention of making it for my mother, who lives in Oregon and loves to visit Multonomah Falls. She calls it, "her falls". I chickened out thinking it would be too difficult for months, and then a few weeks before Christmas, I thought I would give it a try.

It was much easier than I thought it was going to be, and I really enjoyed seeing it come to life! I did substitute a few of the fabrics that it came with, and I changed the border and backing fabric so that it would match her home.

This was made with double-sided fusible webbing, and I machine stitched around each edge.

I will admit...I did chicken out on the machine quilting of the entire piece, and ended up stitching in the ditch on the border only.